


The Visual Purple

by Sresla



Series: Grand Archives of Piltover [1]
Category: League of Legends
Genre: Gen, Science Experiments, Steampunk, Zaun
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-10
Updated: 2018-12-10
Packaged: 2019-09-15 15:50:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16936131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sresla/pseuds/Sresla
Summary: A unique delivery may hold the key to advancing Viktor's Glorious Evolution.





	The Visual Purple

It was a comfort, Viktor reflected, that some civic institutions such as the postal service could still be depended on in Zaun. If one wanted to send an inner-city message, pneuma-tube runners were available to hire, but for packages – such as the human head he just received – the post was a necessity. Even his house in Emberflit Alley existed on a delivery route.

The find still took over a month to arrive. If he was still tethered to emotions such as excitement, anticipation or worry, the delay might have bothered him but Viktor was nothing if not a patient man with a myriad of ongoing projects to occupy his hours. Still, he felt a faint flutter in his chest as he carried the crate to his laboratory, placed it on his middlemost work table and levered it open.

Upon seeing the contents, he frowned. The head was in a large jar, suspended in yellow fluid and if the liquid was what he feared, his experiment was ruined before it began. Urine was for tanning hides and he didn’t intend to wear the man’s face like a mask. Lifting the container free of the box, he unscrewed the lid and wafted the scent of its contents towards him. He sniffed, then dipped a finger deep into the mixture.

Its viscosity and sweet smell confirmed the head was encased in honey and while it didn’t have the preservative power of formaldehyde, it was a natural solution that prevented drying, unlike salt. Viktor glanced around, his eyes seeking one of his curiosities: an ancient vorax fly trapped in a chunk of amber. Its current day descendant was a pest of the Sump, and on his massive to-do list was attempting to adapt their voracious appetite for offal into something more productive: altering the flies’ metabolism to crave and consume chem-forge runoff.

Of its own accord, his mechanical arm stretched out, reaching towards the shelf where the insect resided but Viktor shook his head minutely, refocusing on his present task. There would be time enough for it later. The Lost Child would eventually be persuaded and together they could make time, if need be.

After Viktor issued the necessary commands to his automatons about assembling the apparatus he required, he picked up a notebook and began scribbling in shorthand his additional thoughts about the vorax along with preliminary sketches of the equipment he would need. In the margin, he wrote:

_Investigate medicinal properties of mellification_

Once the device was completed, Viktor removed the head from its vessel and prepared it for his machine by removing both parietal bones in the back of the skull. Like so many of his inventions, his optograph might have found practical application in Piltover reducing illegal enterprise, but his concern no longer lay with the short-sighted individuals there – and Zaun’s lifeblood was crime which he had no interest in curtailing. Then came the exacting process of inserting the elongated stents through the brain tissue into the eyes’ retinas. Through trial and error, Viktor discovered any attempt to pierce through the lens or pupil either obscured the information he needed or rendered it too blurry to be useful. He donned a slit lamp to ensure the procedure was successful, then dusted the corneas with aluminum oxide. Once he injected rhodopsin into the small tubes, Viktor lowered the lights in his lab and sat down to wait as the receptor protein worked.

Before long, dim light began to shine out from the eyes. Gears whirred, pistons hummed and lasers sketched the air as a life-sized image formed. At first only a two-dimensional projection, it gained depth as his optograph extrapolated monochromatic details based on the last thing the dead man saw: the ground, surrounding buildings, a wall and – most importantly – a man.

Once completed, Viktor stood and walked around the hologram, viewing it from all angles. His first thought genuinely surprised him. ‘ _Beautiful._ ’ The man was handsome in a way Viktor himself – nor anyone he knew – had never been. He mourned the man’s left eye and arm; crudely augmented, the puckered flesh around the shoulder conveyed a skill lesser than Viktor’s own although the joint-work looked organic with how it bent and curved. Using motion equations, he calculated that the man came through the wall, rather than over it. Accomplished with the aid of the gemstone inset in his weapon, no doubt. Viktor had been looking for a new power source and it seemed he finally found what he sought after years of fruitless searching: another thaumaturgic crystal whose power might even eclipse the Shuriman artifact Jayce destroyed in his reckless and misguided attack. The investment of every cog paled next to having this confirmation standing in front of him.

He completed another circuit while his third hand caressed the planes of the man’s face, as if trying to commit it to a sense memory the likeness couldn’t convey. It was his expression Viktor found fascinating. It wasn’t the grinning glee of a madman, or anger, righteous or otherwise. Determination. Confidence. _Fearlessness_. The qualities he himself valued above all. The rumors about this man – this assassin – did not do him justice.

Viktor said his name aloud, “Shieda Kayn,” as if speaking it might summon him, like The Howler. He needed him – both the man and his scythe – to aid with the Glorious Evolution, but how could he entice him to Zaun?

Money and death. He walked back to his work table and picked up his notebook again, flipping to a new page and wrote:

_Incite enemies to violence_

The Chem-Barons were forever at one another’s throats, literally scraping for any advantage. The Dredge was overthrown, in turmoil. The Sump was a charnel pit. The right ingredients into the mix would set off a volatile chain reaction and once the common thugs were dead, what else was there to do but hire from outside the city?

Viktor allowed himself a small, tight smile. Enter the Order of Shadow. Enter Kayn.

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Grand Archives of Piltover contest held in November on the League of Legends Concept and Creations forum. Narrative requirement was 1,000 words or less, featuring either Piltover or Zaun (setting or champion, or some appropriate combination). Much shame is being felt as I post this; I thought I caught all the errors prior to entering the contest and noticed two as I was preparing to post it here. Well, they're fixed now, at least. Not that I have a chance at winning but it was good to try something outside my normal fandoms. I got ideas as a result.
> 
> Viktor and the associated settings, as well as other characters alluded to here belong to Riot Games.
> 
> Thank you for reading. A critique is just as valued as praise.


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